Books: Missy

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20

No wonder the girls ejaculated at her smartness.

Finally she turned gentle as a lamb, soft as silk, and let Tess
adjust the saddle; but scarcely had Tess ridden a block before--
wrench!--something happened to the saddle, and Tess was left seated
by the roadside while Gypsy vanished in a cloud of dust. The imp had
deliberately swelled herself out so that the girth would be loose!

Every day brought new revelations of Gypsy's intelligence. Missy
took to spending every spare minute at Tess's. Under this new
captivation her own pet, Poppy, was thoughtlessly neglected. And
duties such as practicing, dusting and darning were deliberately
shirked. Even reading had lost much of its wonted charm: the
haunting, soul-swelling rhythms of poetry, or the oddly phrased
medieval romances which somehow carried you back through the
centuries--into the very presence of those queenly heroines who
trail their robes down the golden stairways of legend. But Missy's
feet seemed to have forgotten the familiar route to the Public
Library and, instead, ever turned eagerly toward the O'Neills'--that
is, toward the O'Neills' barn.

And, if she had admired Tess before, she worshipped her now for so
generously permitting another to share the wonderful pony--it was
like being a half owner. And the odd thing was that, though Gypsy
had undeniable streaks of wildness, Missy never felt a tremor while
on her. On Gypsy she cantered, she trotted, she galloped, just as
naturally and enjoyably as though she had been born on horseback.
Then one epochal day, emulating Tess's example, she essayed to ride
astride. It was wonderful. She could imagine herself a Centaur
princess. And, curiously, she felt not at all embarrassed. Yet she
was glad that, back there in the lot, she was screened by the big
barn from probably critical eyes.

But Gypsy made an unexpected dart into the barn-door, through the
barn, and out into the yard, before Missy realized the capricious
creature's intent. And, as luck would have it, the Reverend MacGill
was sitting on the porch, calling on Grandma Shears. If only it had
been anybody but Rev. MacGill! Missy cherished a secret but profound
admiration for Rev. MacGill; he had come recently to Cherryvale and
was younger than ministers usually are and, though not exactly
handsome, had fascinating dark glowing eyes. Now, as his eyes turned
toward her, she suddenly prickled with embarrassment--her legs were
showing to her knees! She tried vainly to pull down her skirt, then
tried to head Gypsy toward the barn. But Grandma Shears, in
scandalized tones, called out:

"Why, Melissa Merriam! Get down off that horse immediately!"

Shamefacedly Missy obeyed, but none too gracefully since her legs
were not yet accustomed to that straddling position.

"What in the world will you girls be up to next?" Grandma Shears
went on, looking like an outraged Queen Victoria. "I don't know what
this generation's coming to," she lamented, turning to the minister.
"Young girls try to act like hoodlums--deliberately TRY! In my day
girls were trained to be--and desired to be--little ladies."

Little ladies!--in the minister's presence, the phrase didn't fall
pleasantly on Missy's ear.

"Oh, they don't mean any harm," he replied. "Just a little innocent
frolic."

There was a ghost of a twinkle in his eyes. Missy didn't know
whether to be grateful for his tolerance or only more chagrined
because he was laughing at her. She stood, feeling red as a beet,
while Grandma Shears retorted:

"Innocent frolic--nonsense! I'll speak to my daughter!" Then, to
Missy: "Now take that pony back to the lot, please, and let's see no
more such disgraceful exhibitions!"

Missy felt as though she'd been whipped. She felt cold all over and
shivered, as she led Gypsy back, though she knew she was blushing
furiously. Concealed behind the barn door, peeping through a crack,
was Tess.

"It was awful!" moaned Missy. "I can never face Rev. MacGill again!"

"Oh, he's a good sport," said Tess.

"She gave me an awful calling down."

"Oh, grandma's an old fogy." Missy had heard Tess thus pigeonhole
her grandmother often before, but now, for the first time, she
didn't feel a little secret repugnance for the rude classification.

Grandma Shears WAS old-fogyish. But it wasn't her old-fogyishness,
per se, that irritated; it was the fact that her old-fogyishness had
made her "call down" Missy--in front of the minister. Just as if
Missy were a child. Fifteen is not a child, to itself. And it can
rankle and burn, when a pair of admired dark eyes are included in
the situation, just as torturesomely as can twice fifteen.

The Reverend MacGill was destined to play another unwitting part in
Missy's athletic drama which was so jumbled with ecstasies and
discomfitures. A few days later he was invited to the Merriams' for
supper. Missy heard of his coming with mingled emotions. Of course
she thrilled at the prospect of eating at the same table with him--
listening to a person at table, and watching him eat, gives you a
singular sense of intimacy. But there was that riding astride
episode. Would he, maybe, mention it and cause mother to ask
questions? Maybe not, for he was, as Tess had said, a "good sport."
But all the same he'd probably be thinking of it; if he should look
at her again with that amused twinkle, she felt she would die of
shame.

That afternoon she had been out on Gypsy and, chancing to ride by
home on her way back to the sanitarium barn, was hailed by her
mother.

"Missy! I want you to gather some peaches!"

"Well, I'll have to take Gypsy home first."

"No, you won't have time--it's after five already, and I want to
make a deep-dish peach pie. I hear Rev. MacGill's especially fond of
it. You can take Gypsy home after supper. Now hurry up!--I'm
behindhand already."

So Missy led Gypsy into the yard and took the pail her mother
brought out to her.

"The peaches aren't quite ripe," said mother, with a little worried
pucker, "but they'll have to do. They have some lovely peaches at
Picker's, but papa won't hear of my trading at Picker's any more."

Missy thought it silly of her father to have curtailed trading at
Picker's--she missed Arthur's daily visit to the kitchen door with
the delivery-basket--merely because Mr. Picker had beaten father for
election on the Board of Aldermen. Father explained it was a larger
issue than party politics; even had Picker been a Republican he'd
have fought him, he said, for everyone knew Picker was abetting the
Waterworks graft. But Missy didn't see why that should keep him from
buying things from Picker's which mother really needed; mother said
it was "cutting off your nose to spite your face."

Philosophizing on the irrationality of old people, she proceeded to
get enough scarcely-ripe peaches for a deep-dish pie. Being horribly
afraid of climbing, she used the simple expedient of grasping the
lower limbs of the tree and shaking down the fruit.

"Missy!" called mother's voice from the dining room window. "That
horse is slobbering all over the peaches!" "I can't help it--she
follows me every place."

"Then you'll have to tie her up!"

"Tess never ties her up in THEIR yard!"

"Well, I won't have him slobbering over the fruit," repeated mother
firmly.

"I'll--climb the tree," said Missy desperately.

And she did. She was in mortal terror--every second she was sure she
was going to fall--but she couldn't bear the vision of Gypsy's
reproachful eyes above a strangling halter; Gypsy shouldn't think
her hostess, so to speak, less kind than her own mistress.

The peach pie came out beautifully and the supper promised to be a
great success. Mother had zealously ascertained Rev. MacGill's
favourite dishes, and was flushed but triumphant; she came of a
devout family that loved to feed preachers well. And everyone was in
fine spirits; only Missy, at the first, had a few bad moments. WOULD
he mention it? He might think it his duty, think that mother should
know. It was maybe his duty to tell. Preachers have a sterner creed
of duty than other people, of course. She regarded him anxiously
from under the veil of her lashes, wondering what would happen if he
did tell. Mother would be horribly ashamed, and she herself would be
all the more ashamed because mother was. Aunt Nettie would be
satirically disapproving and say cutting things. Father would
probably just laugh, but later he'd be serious and severe. And not
one of them would ever, ever understand.

As the minutes went by, her strain of suspense gradually lessened.
Rev. MacGill was chatting away easily--about the delicious chicken-
stuffing and quince jelly, and the election, and the repairs on the
church steeple, and things like that. Now and then he caught Missy's
eye, but his expression for her was exactly the same as for the
others--no one could suspect there was any secret between them. He
WAS a good sport!

Once a shadow passed outside the window. Gypsy! Missy saw that he
saw, and, as his glance came back to rest upon herself, for a second
her heart surged. But something in his eyes--she couldn't define
exactly what it was save that it was neither censorious nor
quizzical--subtly gave her reassurance. It was as if he had told her
in so many words that everything was all right, for her not to worry
the least little bit. All of a sudden she felt blissfully at peace.
She smiled at him for no reason at all, and he smiled back--a nice,
not at all amused kind of smile. Oh, he was a perfect brick! And
what glorious eyes he had! And that fascinating habit of flinging
his hair back with a quick toss of the head. How gracefully he used
his hands. And what lovely, distinguished table manners--she must
practice that trick of lifting your napkin, delicately and swiftly,
so as to barely touch your lips. She ate her own food in a kind of
trance, unaware of what she was eating; yet it was like eating
supper in heaven.

And then, at the very end, something terrible happened. Marguerite
had brought in the pie'ce de re'sistance, the climactic dish toward
which mother had built the whole meal--the deep-dish peach pie,
sugar-coated, fragrant and savory--and placed it on the serving-
table near the open window. There was a bit, of wire loose at the
lower end of the screen, and, in the one second Marguerite's back
was turned--just one second, but just long enough--Missy saw a
velvety nose fumble with the loose wire, saw a sleek neck wedge
itself through the crevice, and a long red tongue lap approvingly
over the sugar-coated crust.

Missy gasped audibly. Mother followed her eyes, turned, saw, jumped
up--but it was too late. Mrs. Merriam viciously struck at Gypsy's
muzzle and pushed the encroaching head back through the aperture.

"Get away from here!" she cried angrily. "You little beast!"

"I think the pony shows remarkably good taste," commented Rev.
MacGill, trying to pass the calamity off as a joke. But his hostess
wasn't capable of an answering smile; she gazed despairingly,
tragically, at the desecrated confection.

"I took such pains with it," she almost wailed. "It was a deep-dish
peach pie--I made it specially for Mr. MacGill."

"Well, I'm not particularly fond of peach pie, anyway," said the
minister, meaning to be soothing.

"Oh, but I know you ARE! Mrs. Allen said that at her house you took
two helpings-that you said it was your favourite dessert."

The minister coughed a little cough--he was caught in a somewhat
delicate situation; then, always tactful, replied: "Perhaps I did
say that--her peach pie was very good. But I'm equally fond of all
sweets--I have a sweet tooth."

At this point Missy gathered her courage to quaver a suggestion.
"Couldn't you just take off the top crust, mother? Gypsy didn't
touch the underneath part. Why can't you just--"

But her mother's scandalized look silenced her. She must have made a
faux pas. Father and Rev. MacGill laughed outright, and Aunt Nettie
smiled a withering smile.

"That's a brilliant idea," she said satirically. "Perhaps you'd have
us pick out the untouched bits of the crust, too!" Missy regarded
her aunt reproachfully but helplessly; she was too genuinely upset
for any repartee. Why did Aunt Nettie like to put her "in wrong"?
Her suggestion seemed to her perfectly reasonable. Why didn't they
act on it? But of course they'd ignore it, just making fun of her
now but punishing her afterward. For she divined very accurately
that they would hold her accountable for Gypsy's blunder--even
though the blunder was rectifiable; it was a BIG pie, and most of it
as good as ever. They were unreasonable, unjust.

Mother seemed unable to tear herself away from the despoiled
masterpiece.

"Come, mamma," said father, "it's nothing to make such a fuss about.
Just trot out some of that apple sauce of yours. Mr. MacGill doesn't
get to taste anything like that every day." He turned to the
minister. "The world's full of apple sauce--but there's apple sauce
and apple sauce. Now my wife's apple sauce is APPLE SAUCE! I tell
her it's a dish for a king."

And Rev. MacGill, after sampling the impromptu dessert, assured his
hostess that her husband's eulogy had been only too moderate. He
vowed he had never eaten such apple sauce. But Mrs. Merriam still
looked bleak. She knew she could make a better deep-dish peach pie
than Mrs. Allen could. And, then, to give the minister apple sauce
and nabiscos!--the first time he had eaten at her table in two
months!

Missy, who knew her mother well, couldn't help feeling a deep degree
of sympathy; besides, she wished Rev. MacGill might have had his
pie--she liked Rev. MacGill better than ever. But she dreaded her
first moments after the guest had departed; mother could be terribly
stern.

Nor did her fears prove groundless.

"Now, Missy," ordered her mother in coldly irate tones, "you take
that horse straight back to Tess. This is the last straw! For days
you've been no earthly use--your practicing neglected, no time for
your chores, just nothing but that everlasting horse!"

That everlasting horse! Missy's chin quivered and her eyes filled.
But mother went on inflexibly: "I don't want you ever to bring it
here again. And you can't go on living at Tess's, either! We'll see
that you catch up with your practicing."

"But, mother," tremulously seeking for an argument, "I oughtn't to
give up such a fine chance to become a horsewoman, ought I?"

It was an unlucky phrase, for Aunt Nettie was there to catch it up.

"A horsewoman!" and she laughed in sardonic glee. "Well, I must
admit there's one thing horsey enough about you--you always smell of
manure, these days."

Wounded and on the defensive, Missy tried to make her tone chilly.
"I wish you wouldn't be so indelicate, Aunt Nettie," she said.

But Aunt Nettie wasn't abashed. "A horsewoman!" she chortled again.
"I suppose Missy sees herself riding to hounds! All dressed up in a
silk hat and riding-breeches like pictures of society people back
East!"

It didn't add to Missy's comfiture to know she had, in truth,
harboured this ridiculed vision of herself. She coloured and stood
hesitant.

"Someone ought to put pants on that O'Neill girl, anyway," continued
Aunt Nettie with what seemed to her niece unparallelled malice.
"Helen Alison says the Doctor saw her out in the country riding
astraddle. Her mother ought to spank her."

Mother looked at Missy sharply. "Don't let me ever hear of YOU doing
anything like that!"

Missy hung her head, but luckily mother took it for just a general
attitude of dejection. "I can't tolerate tomboys." she went on. "I
can't imagine what's come over you lately."

"It's that O'Neill girl," said Aunt Nettie.

Mother sighed; Missy couldn't know she was lamenting the loss of her
sweet, shy, old-fashioned little girl. But when she spoke next her
accents were firm.

"Now you go and take that horse home. But come straight back and get
to bed so you can get an early start at your practicing in the
morning. Right here I'm going to put my foot down. It isn't because
I want to be harsh--but you never seem to know when to stop a thing.
It's all well and good to be fond of dumb animals, but when it comes
to a point where you can think of nothing else--"

The outstanding import of the terrific and unjust tirade was that
Missy should not go near the sanitarium or the pony for a week.

When mother "put her foot down" like that, hope was gone, indeed.
And a whole week! That was a long, long time when hope is deferred--
especially when one is fifteen and all days are long. At first Missy
didn't see how she was ever to live through the endless period, but,
strangely enough, the dragging days brought to her a change of mood.
It is odd how the colour of our mood, so to speak, can utterly
change; how one day we can desire one kind of thing acutely and
then, the very next day, crave something quite different.

One morning Missy awoke to a dawn of mildest sifted light and
bediamonded dew upon the grass; soft plumes of silver, through the
mist, seemed to trim the vines of the summerhouse and made her catch
her breath in ecstasy. All of a sudden she wanted nothing so much as
to get a book and steal off alone somewhere. The right kind of a
book, of course--something sort of strange and sad that would make
your strange, sad feelings mount up and up inside you till you could
almost die of your beautiful sorrow.

As soon as her routine of duties was finished she gained permission
to go to the Library. As she walked slowly, musingly, down Maple
Avenue, her emotions were fallow ground for every touch of Nature:
the slick greensward of all the lawns, glistening under the torrid
azure of the great arched sky, made walking along the shady sidewalk
inexpressibly sweet; the many-hued flowers in all the flowerbeds
seemed to sing out their vying colours; the strong hard wind passed
almost visible fingers through the thick, rustling mane of the
trees. Oh, she hoped she would find the right kind of book!

Mother, back on the porch, looked up from her sewing to watch the
disappearing figure, and smiled.

"We have our little girl back again," she observed to Aunt Nettie.

"I wish that O'Neill girl'd move away," Aunt Nettie said. "Missy's a
regular chameleon."

It's a pity Missy couldn't hear her new classification; it would
have interested her tremendously; she was always interested in the
perplexing vagaries of her own nature. However, at the Library, she
was quite happy: for she found two books, each the right kind,
though different. One was called "Famous Heroines of Medieval
Legend." They all had names of strange beauty and splendour--
Guinevere--Elaine--Vivien--names which softly rustled in syllables
of silken brocade. The other book was no less satisfying. It was a
book of poems--wonderful poems, by a man named Swinburne--lilting,
haunting things of beauty which washed through her soul like the
waves of a sun-bejewelled sea. She read the choicest verses over and
over till she knew them by heart:

Before the beginning of years, there came to the making of man Grief
with her gift of tears, and Time with her glass that ran . . .

and, equally lovely:

From too much love of living, from hope and fear set free, We thank
with brief thanksgiving whatever gods may be That no life lives
forever; that dead men rise up never; That even the weariest river
winds somewhere safe to sea . . .

The verses brought her beautiful, stirring thoughts to weave into
verses of her own when she should find a quiet hour in the
summerhouse; or to incorporate into soul-soothing improvisings at
the piano.

Next morning, after her hour's stint at finger exercises, she
improvised and it went beautifully. She knew it was a success both
because of her exalted feelings and because Poppy meowed out in
discordant disapproval only once; the rest of the time Poppy purred
as appreciatively as for "The Maiden's Prayer." Dear Poppy! Missy
felt suddenly contrite for her defection from faithful Poppy. And
Poppy was getting old--Aunt Nettie said she'd already lived much
longer than most cats. She might die soon. Through a swift blur of
tears Missy looked out toward the summerhouse where, beneath the
ramblers, she decided Poppy should be buried. Poor Poppy! The tears
came so fast she couldn't wipe them away. She didn't dream that
Swinburne was primarily responsible for those tears.

Yet even her sadness held a strange, poignant element of bliss. It
struck her, oddly, that she was almost enjoying her week of
punishment--that she WAS enjoying it. Why was she enjoying it,
since, when mother first banned athletic pursuits, she had felt like
a martyr? It was queer. She pondered the mysterious complexity of
her nature.

There passed two more days of this inexplicable content. Then came
the thunder-storm. It was, perhaps, the thunder-storm that really
deserves the blame for Missy's climactic athletic catastrophe. No
lightning-bolt struck, yet that thunder-storm indubitably played its
part in Missy's athletic destiny. It was the causation of renewed
turmoil after time of peace.

Tess had telephoned that morning and asked Missy to accompany her to
the Library. But Missy had to practice. In her heart she didn't
really care to go, for, after her stint was finished, she was
contemplating some new improvisings. However, the morning didn't go
well. It was close and sultry and, though she tried to make her
fingers march and trot and gallop as the exercises dictated,
something in the oppressive air set her nerves to tingling. Besides
it grew so dark she couldn't see the notes distinctly. Finally she
abandoned her lesson; but even improvising failed of its wonted
charm. Her fingers kept striking the wrong keys. Then a sudden, ear-
splitting thunder-clap hurled her onto a shrieking discord.

She jumped up from the piano; she was horribly afraid of thunder-
storms--mother wouldn't mind if she stopped till the storm was over.
She longed to go and sit close to mother, to feel the protection of
her presence; but, despite the general softening of her mood, she
had maintained a certain stiffness toward the family. So she
crouched on a sofa in the darkest corner of the room, hiding her
eyes, stopping her ears.

Then a sudden thought brought her bolt upright. Gypsy! Tess had said
Gypsy was afraid of thunder-storms--awfully afraid. And Gypsy was
all alone in that big, gloomy barn--Tess blocks away at the Library.

She tried to hide amongst the cushions again, but visions of Gypsy,
with her bright inquisitive eyes, her funny little petulances, her
endearing cajoleries, kept rising before her. She felt a stab of
remorse; that she could have let even the delights of reading and
improvising compensate for separation from such a darling pony. She
had been selfish, selfcentred. And now Gypsy was alone in that old
barn, trembling and neighing. . .

Finally, unable to endure the picture longer, she crept out to the
hall. She could hear mother and Aunt Nettie in the sitting-room--she
couldn't get an umbrella from the closet. So, without umbrella or
hat, she stole out the front door. Above was a continuous network of
flame as though someone were scratching immense matches all over the
surface of heaven, but doggedly she ran on. The downpour caught her,
but on she sped though rain and hail hammered her head, blinded her
eyes, and drove her drenched garments against her flesh.

She found Gypsy huddled quivering and taut in a corner of the stall.
She put her arms round the satiny neck, and they mutely comforted
each other. It was thus that Tess discovered them; she, too, had run
to Gypsy though it had taken longer as she had farther to go; but
she was not so wet as Missy, having borrowed an umbrella at the
Library.

"_I_ didn't wait to get an umbrella," Missy couldn't forebear
commenting, slightly slurring the truth.

Tess seemed a bit annoyed. "Well, you didn't HAVE to go out in the
rain anyway. Guess I can be depended on to look out for my own pony,
can't I?"

But Missy's tactful rejoinder that she'd only feared Tess mightn't
be able to accomplish the longer distance, served to dissipate the
shadow of jealousy. Before the summer storm had impetuously spent
itself, the friends were crowded companionably in the feed-box,
feeding the reassured Gypsy peppermint sticks--Tess had met Arthur
Simpson on her way to the Library--and talking earnestly.

The earnest talk was born of an illustration Tess had seen in a
magazine at the Library. It was a society story and the illustration
showed the heroine in riding costume.

"She looked awfully swagger," related Tess. "Flicking her crop
against her boot, and a derby hat and stock-collar and riding-
breeches. I think breeches are a lot more swagger than habits."

"Do you think they're a little bit--indelicate?" ventured Missy,
remembering her mother's recent invective against tomboys.

"Of course not!" denied Tess disdainfully. "Valerie Jones in Macon
City wears 'em and she's awfully swell. Her father's a banker. She's
in the thick of things at the Country Club. It's depasse to ride
side-saddle, anyway."

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20